Email Barb for current  real estate listings  at the lake.   of Bond County Office:  (618) 664-7355 Home:  (618) 664-4469 I appreciate your business!! Ask for Barb!

The Governor Bond Lake is fed from the Kingsbury Creek. It covers approximately 772 acres at normal pool and is the water source for the City of Greenville and several neighboring towns. 

The water is introduced into the treatment plant from the intake tower. This tower is constructed of concrete and is located in the lake at the south end near the Water Plant. It has sluice gates; gates that can be manually opened to allow water to come in at different levels in the lake. This is set up now to take water at a depth of 8 feet to 12 feet deep. The intake tower has three low lift pumps to pump lake (raw water)water to the plant. Number one pump will pump 2100 gallons per minute and has a 50 horse power motor, number two pump will pump 1000 gallons per minute and has a 25 horse power motor, number three pump will pump 1500 gallons per minute and has a 30 horsepower motor. 

The lake water (raw water) is pumped to the plant and into the head tank from the intake tower. Prior to the head tank the first chemical that is introduced at the intake tower is potassium permanganate.  This chemical oxidizes soluble manganese so that it can be taken out in the clarification process. Manganese is dead vegetation and dead alga that cause taste and odors in the raw water.  Next, two chemicals are added directly into the raw water line, a coagulate, liquid alum, and a coagulate aid, cationic polymer, which is fed directly into the raw water inline mixer before the head tank.  This is the start of the coagulation process. Carbon is now fed at the head tank to also help control any odors that may occur in the clarifiers. The head tank is 3 feet in diameter, 28 feet tall and holds 1300 gallons of water.  It mixes the chemicals prior to the clarification. 

After the raw water is mixed with the chemicals, it goes to two claricone Clarifier units where an anionic polymer can be fed directly into the sludge blanket (when need to control small pinhead flock particles) in the Clarifiers. The two claricones stand 25 feet in height, 36 ½ feet in diameter and are cone shaped. They hold 74,000 gallons water each. Lime is also introduced at the bottom of the cone in a slurry form to remove the minerals that cause calcium hardness from the raw water. The entrance velocity of the raw water promotes mixing within the vessel’s lower cylinder. The slower rotation in the middle section provides good particle contact and flocculation. There is little turbulence in the top section of the claricone, which makes for good settling of the particles and gives a clarified water.  Chlorine is then added at the surface of the claricones. The claricones operate on what is called a sludge blanket principal; the water passes upward through a blanket of flocculated material called a sludge blanket, which entraps slowly settling particles that would otherwise pass through into the filters. This blanket is suspended below the water level at about 8 feet. Since the sludge is always accumulating from the dirt and turbidity of the water, the sludge blowdown system is designed so that it opens a valve to the claricones. Sludge is drawn off the top of the blanket through the sludge concentrator, this is the cone shaped device in the center of the claricone that is 8 feet below the water level, this device can be raised and lower to determine the right height for the sludge blanket. The sludge that is removed is gravity drained to one of two sludge ponds used only for sludge they are approximately 105 feet by 205 feet. The clarified water off the top of the claricones goes to the recarbination tank, which is 26 feet by 26 feet by 16 feet deep and holds 75,000 gallons water. 

Since softened water has a high pH of about 10.4 and a high concentration of calcium carbonate, it must be stabilized so the calcium carbonate will not precipitate onto the filter media, or on the filter underdrains, or out in the distribution system. This is the reason for the recarbination tank so that when carbon dioxide gas is added to the tank, soluble calcium bicarbonate is formed. The pH is reduced to about 9.0 or to a level at which the water is stabilized to prevent scale formation or corrosion of water mains or piping. From the recarbination tank the water goes into a water pipe where it is chlorinated again and hydrofluosilic acid is applied, more commonly known as fluoride. 

The water is then gravity fed into the filters. There are four rapid sand filters used to remove what little dirt was not removed in the claricones. The filters are composed of gravel, sand and anthracite coal. The gravel is in layers ranging in a grading of course, medium, fine and extra fine. The sand is supported by the gravel and is 14 inches deep with the anthracite coal on top and is 13 inches deep. Glazed tiles in the bottom of the filters support the gravel, sand and anthracite coal. These tiles have small holes in them to permit approximately up to 5 gallons per minute per square foot of filtered water through. The filters are 12 feet by 6 feet by 12 feet deep. 

After the water goes through the filters it enters the clearwell or storage well.  This storage area is under the entire building and is 44 feet by 84 feet by 15 feet deep and holds approximately 400,000 gallons of treated water. Here liquid ammonia is added to combine with the free available chlorine to form a weaker form of disinfectant. The treated water is then pumped into the distribution system through one of four high service pumps. There are two 2100 gallons per minute pumps that have a 250 horsepower motors, one 1000 gallons per minute pump that has a 100 horsepower motor and one 650 gallons per minute pump that has a 75 horsepower motor. There is also one backwash pump that is used to backwash the filters.  It can also be used in an emergency and is a 2600 gallon per minute, pump with a 40 horsepower motor. When the filters become dirty, they are backwashed this is done by pumping water from the clearwell back through the filter in the opposite direction. The dirty water goes outside to one of two backwash ponds, which are 60 feet by 80 feet. The control panels located at each set of filters control the backwash water rate. All equipment is controlled and operated by either automatic control and/or by manual controls. The operator in charge tests water at least twice per shift. 

The water has now completed the purification process. 

Home
The information on this page is deemed reliable but not guaranteed and should not be taken as legally binding.